Apollonius the Nazarene                                     [Image] [Image]

                          Apollonius the Nazarene
                                  Part 6:
                 Events in the life of Apollonius of Tyana
              Apollonius Leaves Iarchus and Returns to Greece
    as recorded in "The Life of Apollonius of Tyana" by his biographer,
                                Philostratus

                  By: Dr. R. W. Bernard, B.A., M.A., Ph.D.



Thus Apollonius departed from his master and teacher. And is it not
possible that just as the name of Apollonius, in the New Testament, was
changed to that of Jesus, so Iarchus became his "Father," while the
Brahmans dwelling on the heights of the Himalayas became "angels in
heaven"? As a farewell gift, the Brahman sages, on the threshold of their
valley of mediation, gave Apollonius and Damis camels on which to cross
India westward to the Red Sea, where they continued their journey by
water.

Apollonius returned to Greece from India to accomplish the same mission
that Pythagoras had done before him, namely, to carry westward the Wisdom
of the East, for which his predecessor won only persecution, ending in the
burning of the Pythagorean meeting-house in which Pythagoras and his
disciples were assembled.*

     (*Indicating that on his departure from the Brahmans, Apollonius
     considered himself as their emissary to accomplish in Greece
     what their last student, Pythagoras, had done five centuries
     previously, Mrs. St. Clair Stoddard writes, "Thus he conceived
     it to be his mission to restore to the Greeks something of the
     ancient wisdom of Pythagoras. And at the conclusion of these
     travels he was indeed abundantly endowed with occult (spiritual)
     wisdom which powerfully enforced his own supernormal gifts and
     on returning to Greece he was regarded as a divine person."

     That Apollonius considered himself as continuing the work that
     Pythagoras had initiated five centuries previously is indicated
     by his statement to the spirit of Achilles, in which he referred
     to Pythagoras as "my spiritual ancestor.")

On his way home, Apollonius sent the following letter to Iarchus:

     "Iarchus and the other sages, from Apollonius, greetings: I came
     to you by land; with your aid I return by sea, and might have
     returned even by air -- such is the wisdom you have imparted to
     me."*

          (* de Beauvoir Priaulaux, in his "The Indian Travels
          of Apollonius of Tyana," written in 1873, comments as
          follows on this statement: "Easy and pleasant as this
          mode of travel [air] is thought to be, Apollonius had
          recourse to it but once -- on that memorable occasion
          when about midday he disappeared before the tribunal
          of Domitian, and the same evening met Damis at
          Ciachaerchia.")

     "Even among the Greeks I shall not forget these things, and
     shall still hold commerce with you -- or I have indeed vainly
     drunk of the cup of Tantalus. Farewell, ye best philosophers."

According to another translation, Apollonius's letter read as follows:

     "I came to you by land and ye have given me the sea, rather, by
     sharing with me your wisdom, ye have given me power to travel
     through heaven. These things will I bring back to the mind of
     the Greeks, and I will hold converse with you as though ye were
     present, if it be that I have not drunk of the cup of Tantalus
     in vain."*

          (*From Iarchus, his master, Apollonius received the
          "cup of Tantalus," symbolizing the wisdom which it was
          his mission to bring back to Greece as Pythagoras had
          done before him. Tantalus is fabled to have stolen the
          cup of nectar from the gods; this was the "amrita,"
          the ocean of immortality and wisdom of the Hindus.)

Mead in his "Apollonius of Tyana," makes the following comment on this
quotation: "It is evident from these cryptic sentences that the 'sea' and
the 'cup of Tantalus' are identical with the 'wisdom' which had been
imparted to Apollonius -- a wisdom which he was to bring back once more to
the memory of the Greeks. He thus clearly states that he returned from
India with a distinct mission and with the means to accomplish it, for not
only had he drunk of the ocean of wisdom in that he has learnt the Brahma
Vidya* from their lips, but he has also learnt how to converse with them
though his body be in Greece and their bodies in India." [*Brahma Vidya:
the knowledge of Brahman or God, the universal spiritual Consciousness
which creates, sustains and permeates the entire cosmos].

                                  *******
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

WWW design and text editing Copyrighted © 1996-1997 by Jeroen Wierda
Picard UFO Research International